Free Republic

Russia has today launched all-out war on Ukraine with simultaneous attacks coming from south, east and north, by land and by air. Missiles and bombs rained from the sky, tanks rolled across the border, helicopters buzzed in and explosions were seen across the country after Vladimir Putin gave the order to attack. By midday Monday, the skies over Kiev swarmed with Russian attack helicopters which seized control of Gostomel air base. But Ukrainian forces launched a fight-back with ground forces moving in to retake the air field as jets streaking over the city, followed by reports that up to four...

Washington -- What is running through the mind of Russian President Vladimir Putin as 150,000 of his troops mass along the border of Ukraine? Military experts in the West say the Ukrainian defenders are no match for the Russians, though the Russian army has not been in a major war for decades. The Ukrainians from their bunkers are issuing blood-curdling threats, and they are armed to the hilt. They have the advantage of fighting on their home turf. Their backs are against the wall. Even the women of Ukraine are armed. Here is my reasoning for saying things in the...

Ann Coulter: Stop Talking About Ukraine, Republicans! Amid the media’s 24/7 UKRAINE UPDATES, perhaps some enterprising journalist could write an article explaining how our esteem for that country’s borders benefits a single American — other than President Joe Biden. Our own border has become a transmission belt for the third world, bringing in rapists, murderers, future welfare recipients, and left-wing activists. The Democratic Party’s brilliant policy of defunding the police and emptying the prisons has, oddly enough, led to a breathtaking surge in violent crime. Our schools have been taken over by lunatics who teach white kids that they are...

24 February 2022Thursday of week 7 in Ordinary Time St. Matthias Church, Budapest, Hungary Readings at MassLiturgical Colour: Green.First readingJames 5:1-6 ©The Lord hears the cries of those you have cheatedAn answer for the rich. Start crying, weep for the miseries that are coming to you. Your wealth is all rotting, your clothes are all eaten up by moths. All your gold and your silver are corroding away, and the same corrosion will be your own sentence, and eat into your body. It was a burning fire that you stored up as your treasure for the last days. Labourers mowed...

Former President Donald Trump called Russian President Vladimir Putin smart and criticized the U.S. response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “I mean, he’s taking over a country for $2 worth of sanctions. I’d say that’s pretty smart,” Mr. Trump said during a fundraiser at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Wednesday night, according to a recording of the event posted online, contending that Mr. Putin wouldn’t have invaded if he were still president. In a telephone interview with Fox News late Wednesday night, as Russia launched its invasion, Mr. Trump called the unfolding events a “very sad thing for the...

Pray For The Peace of Jerusalem1 Thessalonians 49 Now about your love for one another we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. 10 And in fact, you do love all of God’s family throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers and sisters, to do so more and more, 11 and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, 12 so that your daily life may win the respect of...

Joe Biden hasn’t “botched” the border. He is, like Vladimir Putin, simply carrying out a very intentional plan. Borders have been on my mind lately. Unlike some of my friends on the Old Right, I do not think Russian President Vladimir Putin is a pious, virtuous man, although I do admire his obvious virility and understand his contempt for girly Western leaders. But this fellow has been up to mischief. Right now he is moving Russian troops into two Ukrainian breakaway regions, Donetsk and Luhansk, while 140,000 well-armed Russian troops have been massed on the Ukrainian border. SNIP What is...

A severely disabled woman was found by Kent police inside a car that had been in a tow yard for nine days, according to the Kent Police Department. Around 3:15 p.m. on Feb. 14, Kent police responded to a report of a missing person. The reporting person told officers her severely disabled sister had not been seen since earlier in the month. An investigation revealed the woman was last seen on Feb. 5, when her mother parked her car at a gas station in Kent and walked off, leaving her daughter in the car. At the request of the gas...

The term "gerrymander" derives from Elbridge Gerry, a Founding Father and vice president who, as governor of Massachusetts, approved an oddly drawn state senate district to benefit his Democratic-Republican Party over the Federalist Party. Both parties do it. Both parties complain when the other party does it to them. Consider recent GOP "gerrymandering" efforts. Former President Barack 0bama accused Republicans of "passing laws designed to prevent American citizens from exercising their right to vote. And drawing congressional maps that drown out the voice of ordinary people." 0bama added: "Rather than argue, based on ideas, they are trying to tilt the...

Unlike most peanut butters, which exist on the spectrum between sweet and plain, the Haitian version known as mamba is typically laced with chilies. When made by hand, mamba starts with a giant pot over an open fire, often in a backyard. Cooks roast the peanuts, keeping them moving against the pot’s hot walls, then pour them into a woven winnowing tray. The process of separating the peanuts from their shells is a practiced maneuver, a rhythmic tossing and catching, tossing and catching, until the nuts are rendered shiny and skinless. Before the batch of nuts takes a ride through...

On Tuesday, the Department of Defense authorized the deployment of over 700 National Guard members and over 50 tactical vehicles in anticipation of multiple trucker convoy protests that are expected to take place in Washington, D.C. According to CNN, the National Guardsmen will not be armed, but will instead be stationed around the city to provide control and support at various traffic points. They allegedly will not be authorized to carry out law enforcement duties or mass surveillance. In addition, the DC National Guard is prohibited from using any aircraft during the protests. The deployment comes after the Pentagon received...

A friend on FR sent me a Freepmail, warning me to take prudent electronic measures. This is due to the recent actions in Ukraine, and our possible (hamhanded) response, followed by a likely all-out cyber war. A cyber war could do quite a bit of damage, disrupting financial institutions and even shutting down our water and electricity. Therefore, I will take my friends post, and expand it. Please take some prudent measures. If nothing happens, GREAT.... but if something happens, you'll think back to that time when your good ole' buddy Laz warned you, and you heeded him. PRUDENT MEASURES...

Sen. Mitt Romney blamed former President Donald Trump’s policy of “America first” after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a military operation in Ukraine. “Putin’s impunity predictably follows our tepid response to his previous horrors in Georgia and Crimea, our naive efforts at a one-sided ‘reset’ and the shortsightedness of ‘America First,'” Romney said in a statement released on social media Wednesday evening.

The White House said Wednesday President Joe Biden will address Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attacks in Ukraine in the “early afternoon” on Thursday. “[T]omorrow in the early afternoon, President Biden will deliver remarks announcing the further consequences the United States and our Allies and partners will impose on Russia for its unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine,” a White House official stated to reporters on Wednesday evening after Putin announced the beginning of a military operation in Ukraine.

Central European countries on Thursday readied themselves to receive an influx of refugees fleeing Ukraine following Russia’s invasion. Poland is setting up reception points for refugees on its border with Ukraine, while Hungary is planning to deploy forces to its shared border with Ukraine for security and humanitarian purposes. German media cited estimations that Ukrainian refugees fleeing into the European Union may number between 200,000 and a million. Germany's Interior Minister Nancy Faeser on Thursday stated they will offer support to countries in Eastern Europe, including Poland, that are facing an influx of refugees following the Russian invasion.

It is easy to predict what the Russian president will do in any given situation. Biden is making it easier for Putin to act with aggression. or all his caginess, dissimulation, and opportunism, Vladimir Putin is more or less predictable. Putin’s aims? The Russian president’s two-decade dilemma has been how to reclaim the prestige and power of the former Soviet Union—but with only 75 percent of his country’s former territory and 140 million fewer people. When does he strike? First, Putin moves on neighboring former Soviet republics when the world price of oil is high, and his coffers are full....

What is behind recent pessimistic appraisals of democracy's future, from Hillary Clinton, Adam Schiff, Brian Williams and other elite intellectuals, media personalities, and politicians on the Left? Some are warning about its possible erosion in 2024. Others predict democracy's downturn as early 2022, with scary scenarios of "autocracy" and Trump "coups." To answer that question, understand first what is not behind these shrill forecasts. They are not worried about 2 million foreign nationals crashing the border in a single year, without vaccinations during a pandemic. Yet it seems insurrectionary for a government simply to nullify its own immigration laws. They...

It’s just the flu, bro. Ukraine update: Ukrainian President declares a state of emergency even bough there are still no reports of 18-wheeler transfer trucks parked in urban areas. Importantly though, only 35% of Ukraine is vaccinated. And only 2% is boosted. This is hugh and series as people will be crowded together. Supply lines of N95 masks will be compromised as well. If the internet goes down then that is when the real trouble hits because then Ukrainians won’t be able to access the CDC website.

NATO will activate its defensive Response Force in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Secretary Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday. The decision was made by NATO's North Atlantic Council. "Peace on our continent has been shattered," Stoltenberg said. "We now have war in Europe on a scale and of a type we thought belonged to history."

If you offered people $100 to name a Supreme Court Justice, I bet you’d lose quite a bit of money. If you challenged random people to name a Cabinet Secretary, you’d still lose money, just not at much. If the challenge was to name any Postmaster General other than Benjamin Franklin, your money would be safe. Unless you happen to be an activist liberal, that is, then the name will roll of your tongue with venom: Louis DeJoy. Since November 5, 2020, I have received 238 fundraising emails from left-wing groups about just how awful Mr. DeJoy is. Missing from...